“It must be very – late,” she said. “I must go – back.”
She rose as she spoke and he too rose to his feet.
They stood looking at each other.
Then the Earl said very quietly,
“You are going to help me, Olinda? I cannot do it without you.”
“Are you – sure you want – me?”
He smiled.
“More sure than I have been of anything in my whole life.”
“Then I will – do whatever you – want.”
He put his arms around her and drew her close and she quivered at his touch, but he did not kiss her.
Instead he held her very tightly, his cheek against hers.
“I still don’t believe you are real,” he said. “You are my dream, the dream I have always dreamt here by the Temple. That is what I want you to be, because it is the only thing that will keep me sane and keep me fighting.”
Olinda did not reply.
Sh
